


like you do

by x (ordinary)



Series: A Kiss Like Death [2]
Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Abusive Relationships, Coercion, Dubious Consent, Emotional Manipulation, F/M, Homelessness, Imprisonment, Lyrium Addiction, Manipulation, Non-Consensual Drug Use, Original Character Death(s), Prostitution, Psychopathology & Sociopathy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-05
Updated: 2015-07-25
Packaged: 2018-03-10 11:25:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 1,581
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3288632
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ordinary/pseuds/x
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She took him in from the streets and gave him a home. Most days he's not sure whether or not that was for the best.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. i.

**Author's Note:**

> guess who's back 
> 
> 1\. ficlet again, i am still not confident enough in my own ability to do more! maybe one day! :)  
> 2\. timeline stuff: in da2, he was not reinstated, and has been handling the addiction since. in da:i, i went pro-templar, and have headcanon'd someone else as the leader of the red lyrium army-- aka, he's just a sad sack of shit, i'm sorry samson  
> 3\. this ficlet is not related to the previous one very much, save for the inquisitor. who is, uh, scary, so mind the warnings!

**i.**

Addiction comes in many forms. Gambling, women, ale, violence. Sometimes all of the above. Each one of them is a vice, tolerable in moderation but a detriment in excess. 

If only Lyrium was such a kind mistress.

Even a few grains of the dust was _too much_ , each hit a stepping stone on a path to the Void, paved in blue powder and Chantry orders. After all these years of expected use, it is a crutch. The day is too hard, and grey, and painful to bear without Lyrium to ease the bite. Going without means that within two days, the madness nips at his heels. After three, the delusions follow.

Just because they never let him back into the order doesn't mean he's suddenly stopped  _needing_  it. As if something so trivial as a mere dismissal could break the grasp of razor-wire wrapped around his neck. It was ever present, ever tightening. The cycle is unbreakable: the withdrawal never ends. It yawns on until it consumes everything in its wake, and sometimes it feels like he's constantly on the verge of collapse.

(And he hates himself, for thinking that those are the _good_ times.)

So what is he left with, once the dust settles? What does a man like him have to offer the world, now that his title (his honor, his livelihood, his good word) has been stripped?

His sword? No one take it.

His skills? No one trusts them.

His trade? He has none: the order had been his life until they'd decided he wasn't  _enough--_ and wasn't that the story of his sorry fucking life?

 

(And the problem is this: he knows exactly where it leaves him. It certainly isn't the Rose.)

 


	2. ii.

**ii.**

The first time he catches a glimpse of the Inquisitor, Samson can't be sure that it's her at all.

There's something in the way she stands-- both proud and resentful, like the world owes her a favor but the world doesn't realize it yet-- that sets her apart. It could be anyone under that weather-beaten cloak and heavy hood, lingering just outside the inn. Was more likely to be just another weary traveler passing through the tavern, curious about the beggar across the street. Most people thought of him in relation to how they could say  _nothing to spare, sorry_.

She surveys the alley, pausing only briefly as her gaze passes over where Samson sits. _Cursory_. The tilt of her head is barely perceptible from beneath the hood, but at just this angle, he catches the barest hint of a smile on a freckled face.

And then she's gone: with no green hand at the ready, no bow and arrow against her back.

Must not have been her, after all.


	3. iii.

iii.

Time passes in every way but linear when you lack fixed points. Every day yawns on into eternity, a test of his mind and how easily he can empty it. Every day is ruthless, leaving his jaw aching and his bones weary.

It's easy ( _easier_ ) to justify it, when his hands are shaking, the Lyrium crystal almost within his grasp. Samson reviles how he keens for it, for the cool, smooth rock that serves as a balm against his searing thoughts. Most of all, though, he hates the burst of clarity before the high takes hold, leaving him just enough time to fill himself with self-loathing before nothing matters all over again.

Maker damn it all, he can almost _taste_ the Lyrium in the air. Sharp and acrid, like lightning magic--

 "Hello, Samson," she says, sweet as poisoned honey. Lavender eyes look upon him in judgment, and find him wanting.


	4. iv.

  
iv.  
  
The angular lines of her boot runs all the way up to the plumpest part of her bare, pale thigh. The toe of it presses insistently against Samson's gut, its hidden blade fully extended. Inquisitor Else looks down at him, and there's no kindness in them. In fact, there's not much of anything there: they're like a doll's. Pretty. _Hollow_.

They glitter in the dim, the undeniable green of her mark reflected in them. This is not the gracious, pious highborn girl from the stories.

"Hello, Samson." Her plummy lips-- recently stained red-- twist into a smile that's anything but pretty. "I've heard so much about you."  
  
(And he is baring his teeth, on instinct, chest aflutter. A stray dog on the defensive, an animal backed into a corner. All he's missing is a torn up ear, and how does she know his  _name_ \--)

"I think it's high time for you to come _home_ , don't you?"

The pressure against his belly doesn't relent, equally a promise and a threat. Her look is patient, expectant: Samson tenses with his unease, and pauses only to wet his lip, tongue running across their cracks, but it's enough of a pause. She slips gloved fingers into his mouth, and that blissful heaven rushes through his veins.

Cool and blue, lovely and sweet. She's given him Lyrium-- pure, unadulterated, the best he's had in days-weeks- _years_ \--

"Why," Samson croaks, the flush high on his unshaven face, spreading across his thin nose. It's been cold, in the North, and the warmth Samson feels right now is unparalleled, a cozy embrace that he can't escape, nor does he want to. 

(Later, he'll realize: that's the way she likes it.)

"It was a rhetorical question, sweetling. You never had a choice in this." A delicate finger caresses his cheek, and there's a thoughtful look on Elyse's face.  "I give Cullen whatever he wants, and what he wanted was _you_."


	5. v.

v.  
  
It's not that easy, of course. She may be a woman but Elyse is no waif: Samson quickly learned that despite her soft look at first glance, she's wiry-strong from training, every inch of her honed into a weapon, misleading appearances and all.

He isn't sure if he wants to know where the owners of the house went, and asking her only reinforces the opinion that he probably shouldn't have as she answers with beatific smile: "Oh, I wouldn't worry. They'll not disturb us. They've all gone to serve the Maker." 

(There are red stains in the kitchen. The family's pet mabari is never hungry.)

Samson has  _so many_  questions and an equal amount of fury, But all of Elyse's answers are all the same: pleasant condescension, sometimes accompanied by Lyrium to ply him like a dog. And Maker damn her, it works. Time passes him by while he's in the stupor, tongue lolling as she explores the cavern of his mouth with her fingers, idly counting each of his teeth. His body is a temple and she is the desecration, and in the throes he once tells her that anything she wants to do to him has already been done by countless others. To just  _do what she wants_ to him, and get it over with, and the self-loathing roils off of of him in waves.

And Elyse tilts her head at him, perplexed. Her fingers press against his fluttering heart, pinky brushing the delicate space between two ribs.

"Oh, Sammy," she murmurs, pressing a chaste kiss to his sweatslicked brow. "Of all your lessons to come, this is the first. Don't make me offers that you're not ready to keep."


	6. vi.

"Are you ready?" she asks, sometimes, in the furious moments of his sobriety, accompanied by that empty stare of hers. His thin lips curl back, fists clenched.

"I will not be a kept-" 

"What you will or will not matters not to me. What you _are,_ Samson, is this." She fists a metal-clad hand into his hair, tugging him up from the ground, his body weak from a cavalcade of addictions. She wraps her other hand around his neck, the chill of her gauntlet divine, despite it all. He's never been so feverish.

"You are _m_ _ine_."

\--

He does not ask her about Cullen, but she doesn't take offense. No matter what vile things he says or threaten, she never rises to the bait. Elyse studies him like a puzzle-- like a dog-- touching as she wants, plying him beforehand if he thrashes.

She fucks Samson on the floor, pinning his skinny hips down with hers, using him as an object of her desire. With eyes rolled back into his head, teeth grinding, pleasure-blind, he wishes that it wasn't so good. Wishes that he wanted to go  _home--_

But he doesn't have one to miss.

 

\--

(She presses blue-slicked fingers into his mouth, and he forgets he could miss anything at all.)

\--

"You're allowed," she says, sweetly, "to pick one."

One is blue and small, packed tight with powder and a singular crystal unrefined-- and the other is at least double in size, more red than not.

The words pick your poison had never been so literal.

Samson looks up at her, red hair illuminated. He knows he's near delirious, but Elyse's teeth are on display in a smile too sharp to be anything but genuine. He reaches for the crystal, mouth watering, self-reviling. He reaches for the crystal but she snatches at his hand, crushing bony fingers in her gauntlet, face pulled taut.

"No," he whispers, broken, but Elyse doesn't yield. No, he tells himself, and reaches for the crystal with his tongue. It's _electrifying,_ the taste of tainted magic encompassing his mind, and Samson grows more eager than before, laving it without shame, his every bone shaking.

" _Good_ boy," Elyse says, petting his thinning hair, smiling. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hm, found a draft for this, but i think this is as far as it goes for this ficletworld!

**Author's Note:**

> note: moved to my main


End file.
